Wenger blasts Rovers ref (AUDIO)

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger bemoans the 1-0 loss to Blackburn Rovers in the FA Cup, the Gunners' 3rd loss in a row in all competitions, but insists referee Graham Poll's failure to award his side two penalties was the ultimate factor in them going out of the FA Cup.

Your Comments (oldest first)

Is there anyway Arsenal can take this matter of the linesman to court? If it can be proved that the linesman told a lie surely there are grounds to reverse the decision. We are talking about big money being wasted with having players missing games. Itís not a Sunday run in the park. Other sports have further areas to redress their complaints and when it is so obliviously wrong there must be some recourse. There was evidence of Ces being hit by Chelsea players and no action taken why? As for the game against Blackburn, we will just have to put it done to a lackluster performance. Too many passes lost to the other side. I donít think you can point the finger at anyone on an overall poor display by both sides. We will come out of this down ward slip and next you know they will be back to normal business.

I would like to analyse the game from 2 perspectives:
1) A Gooner point of view - We have a lot of players missing from the game. Players who were available played a game too many in a short space of time. We did not have enough protection from the ref obviously. We we fouled against about 30 times but Blackburn only got away with 3 yellow cards. The fourth was for McCarthy's elaborated goal celebration. also we were denied 3 clear cut penalties in 2 legs. A lot of teams are now exploiting the fact that ref here rarely flash a card if a player is not hacked down. Hence they are resorting to all sorts of rough house tactic as long as the victim is not tripped (ramming, dragging, tugging, pushing, pulling etc)
2) An objective point of view - There's really no point complaining about our opponents' tactic. It just serve as an approval that they were doing something right in containing us. We have been telling, yelling and screaming in frustration for the third year in a row now that teams often defence too deeply, resort to long ball, play rougher and time wasting. What do we get? Increasingly, more and more teams are learning to do that against us. Why Man USA and Chelski are coping whereas we are still struggling? Why cant we learn to play to our opponent's weakness instead of stubbornly playing to our strength which others have found ways to neautralised? Lets analysed how our weaknesses were exploited in the last 3 defeats in separate cups. PSV - defended deeply and hoof long balls to flank throughout the game. Scored a goal and got all men behind ball. Chelski - Kept attacking at our weakest back with long balls. First at our left back, then at the right when we made a tactical change to play Hoyte on the left. Also exploited Senderos' vulnerability against Drogba. Blackburn - Distrupted our fluency with rough play to buy time for their defence to get back into position. They already have 2 layers of defense by the time we got near their box. Attacked our right back with long balls when Walcott came on for Eboue and paid off consequently. Time to revise our tactic I guess.

Firstly, a Liverpool fan coming on here and calling our kids over rated is laughable and obviously the product of a glory hunter. Secondly, there was a huge fanfare when Wigan were denied a questionable penalty at the Grove, we should have had three against B'burn, Pedersen should have been sent off etc. Thirdly, match report will be a bit later today, huge moderation meeting thingy.

L F POOL, do you not see the irony of you calling our youngsters overated when they beat you so comprehensively when Wenger played them? Difference is that Wenger was forced into his selection last night by injuries/ suspensions.

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